


Gently, Slowly Drink

by PompousPickle



Category: IDOLiSH7 (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Kitsune Mitsuki, M/M, Mutual Pining, Non-Idol AU, Sort Of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-13
Updated: 2018-12-13
Packaged: 2019-09-17 06:00:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16969029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PompousPickle/pseuds/PompousPickle
Summary: Yamato's world was ordinary, dull, and tedious. Mitsuki's world was something else entirely, and Yamato couldn't seem to stay away.





	Gently, Slowly Drink

**Author's Note:**

> [very light spoilers for Yamato's character story in the game, but nothing major]

“You know, there are stories about foxes that disguise themselves as beautiful women, and marry human men as their devoted housewives.”

Mitsuki Izumi looked up from the plate of cookies that he was frosting, raising an eyebrow at the man on the other side of the counter. He never took Yamato to be the type to do extensive amounts of research on folklore. “Where did you read that, Old Man?”

“Oh you know, here and there. I’m smarter than I look, you know.” Yamato shrugged, leaning over the counter of _Fonte Chocolat_ with a lazy smile on his face. His tie was loosened, and there were heavy circles under his eyes. He was completely drained from work, long days at the office beginning to wear him down to a haggard old man. A few months ago, he would have gone straight home, popped open a beer, rented a terrible AV, and called it a night.

But now…

“Anyway, I’m just saying that you’re pretty good and cooking and cleaning, Mitsu. It’s a shame you’re not a beautiful woman.”

Mitsuki bristled, shooting a cold glare as he placed the finished cookies onto a display tray. “Did you even read the rest of those stories?” Despite Yamato’s teasing, he felt a smile tug at his lips, remembering stories from long ago. Ones told to him by his aunts and uncles. “Foolish men would try to catch their wives bathing, despite telling their husbands to respect their privacy. In their lusty pursuits, they would catch the women naked, with their ears and tails on display, and the fox’s secret would be revealed.”

He looked up at Yamato, his orange eyes glinting in the bright light of the bakery. “That’s not the kind of thing a fox can simply let slide, you know. So the next day, the poor idiots would wake up on the side of the road, miles from home and covered in dirt, with absolutely no memory of how they got there.”

“You really know how to ruin an onii-san’s good time, don’t you?”

Mitsuki laughed, and the entire shop seemed to laugh with him. The round lights hanging from the ceiling always seemed to glow a little brighter, the music in the background picked up pace, and the customers of the store all relaxed noticeably, as though by some kind of enchantment. Yamato looked around, observing it all. The more they ate, the lighter they became, as if Mitsuki’s pastries were sucking out the poison in their lives.

Yamato sighed, a small smile on his lips. They didn’t even know the half of it.

“Now,” Mitsuki clapped his hands, after sliding the tray of cookies into the display case. The frosting caught the light, glittering ever so slightly. They were decorated like little lanterns, burning in bright yellows, reds and blue. “I don’t think a lazy lug like you would have come all this way just to tell me something you read on the internet.”

“Hm? But I had a good time doing all that research.” Yamato stood up straight, despite himself, glancing out towards the café again in an attempt to hide his nervousness. Mitsuki removed the rubber gloves that he had been using as he worked, tossing them into a nearby trashcan. He walked to the gate that separated the counter from the front of the shop. He popped it open, looking up at Yamato with a smug smile as he nodded for him to follow. Yamato swallowed thickly, wondering if he was ever going to get used to this.

“Just come on! Don’t make me wait,” Mitsuki rolled his eyes as he walked to the back, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Yamato was following him. Once he confirmed, he looked back quickly. He didn’t want to seem desperate. He didn’t want the human to know how often Mitsuki had thought about this. How he craned his neck every time the bell chimed at the bakery. How he hoped that Yamato had gotten off of work early, and needed his fix as badly as Mitsuki needed him.

The kitchen was almost immaculately clean, as it always was. Yamato always wondered if that was a common thread for Mitsuki’s species, or if that was just the man’s own hard work and dedication. After all, despite everything, he seemed to love the shop. He put his all into everything he made, so that every single customer could feel the power seeping out every crumb.

Yamato felt a pang of jealousy, just before Mitsuki turned around and pressed him against the kitchen wall, with absolutely no ceremony. His back hit the cool white tile, sending his heart lurching into the back of his throat. The shorter man craned his head up, eyes fluttering shut, and Yamato’s mouth went completely dry, before finally finding the strength to push him away.

“Hey now! I need to prepare first,” Yamato managed to breathe out, shuffling to the side. “You’re going to give an old man a heart attack, coming onto me like that,” he chuckled, wishing desperately that’s all there was to it; that Mitsuki simply wanted him that badly.  

Mitsuki, however, laughed in turn. “Sorry! It’s been a few days; I must have gotten pretty hungry waiting for you!”

Yamato wasn’t sure how much of that was a joke, but he knew his heart hadn’t slowed down at all. He needed to focus. He needed to focus on all the things he wanted Mitsuki to take away from him. His annoying, gossiping coworkers. The buzzing, incessant florescent lights. The dust building up in the corners of the aging office building. His demanding, faceless boss.

His anger, every time he saw a poster for an old samurai movie. His frustration every time an entertainment magazine published a new gossip column. His hatred. His loneliness. His inability to do anything other than to go through the motions, living a perfectly ordinary life.

“I think I’m ready now.”

“You humans are so weird,” Mitsuki shook his head, stepping back in, more gently this time. He pressed forward again, nearly on his tiptoes as he moved his lips towards Yamato’s. He looked up at him through his eyelashes, coy and soft. “May I?” He asked this time, a teasing lilt to his voice that made Yamato’s heart plummet from where it had been in his throat, all the way to his stomach.

He only nodded, desperately trying to hang onto all the anger and frustration that had brought him to the bakery in the first place.

Mitsuki sighed gratefully, pressing his lips to Yamato and digging in. He closed his eyes, drawing out whatever bits of life Yamato was willing to give him. He bit into the emails his boss had sent him, detailing every mistake Yamato had made that week. He tore into the memory, swallowing it down as he pulled up the next. There was exhaustion. There was boredom. There was sadness. It never tasted particularly good. But it was _Yamato_. It was what Yamato was willing to give him. It was what Yamato trusted Mitsuki to take away.

Mitsuki let himself get lost in it, moving his lips gently against the other man as he drew it out. He pressed his chest against him, to feel the beating of his heart, to make sure the human still had plenty left to give. His heart was racing, and Mitsuki could tell that he was desperate to only give Mitsuki the immediate memories, the recent pains. There was still so much lurking underneath. So much that he wasn’t willing to show. Mitsuki could tear it out of him, of course. He could devour Yamato whole, if he wanted. And he had a feeling that Yamato would let him.

But for now, all he wanted to do was gently, slowly drink.

He pulled away with a satisfied huff, opening his eyes as his lingering hunger fully subsided. Yamato had sunk down against the wall, pressing himself against it for balance. He had a soft smile on his face, as though Mitsuki hadn’t just sucked away a small portion of the man’s life. Mitsuki shook his head, offering the man a hand to help stabilize him.

However, instead, Yamato reached outward, gently touching the top of Mitsuki’s head. “You were careless, Mitsu” he said, chastising the fox for letting his ears pop out during feeding. From the surprised look on his face, it seemed that Mitsuki had no idea he had let it happen either. Yamato half-expected him to dart away from his touch, but he did no such thing, allowing Yamato to run his fingers over the soft ears.

“Damn, it looks like you found me out,” Mitsuki finally laughed, a playful twinkle in his eyes. Yamato bit his lip. “Well, you know the rules. I’ll have to punish you somehow.”

Mitsuki stepped away from Yamato’s touch, shaking his head. He scrunched his eyes shut, focusing once again on perfecting his disguise, and ridding himself of the feeling of Yamato’s fingers gently petting over his ears, his thumb brushing over the sensitive skin on the tip.

He shook his head again, more forcefully this time.

“Punish me? After the great meal and everything?” Yamato finally straightened himself out, following Mitsuki back from the kitchen to the front of the shop. The baker had abandoned his customers long enough, after all.

“You really don’t taste that good.” Mitsuki quipped quickly.

“Fine. Then what do you have in mind?” Yamato stepped back through the gate, into the main body of the shop. And somehow, the lights around him seemed even warmer, as though Mitsuki’s influence were even stronger than before.

“Hmm, I wonder,” Mitsuki pondered, walking over to a tray of macarons that had been cooling on the back counter. They had been waiting to be filled with just a little touch of the magic that made his pastries so divine, and brought his customers back begging for more. And now that he was well-fed, he could do just that. “Perhaps madness. I could fill you with illusions and make you run through the streets naked, and give away all of your money to strangers.”

“I really hate to inform you this, but I’m broke.”

“Yeah, I could believe that. Possession, then?” He turned away from the other man, grabbing for the fillings he had prepared for the cookies.

Yamato raised an eyebrow, a sly smirk growing on his face. “There are easier ways to see me naked, Mitsu,” he leered, leaning over the glass counter just a little bit. Mitsuki stiffened visibly, caught off guard. And for just a second, Yamato could barely see Mitsuki’s tail peek out from under the hem of his shirt. Yamato felt a small thrill run through him, being able to surprise the creature that had filled his life with so many wonders.  

“Okay so possession is out,” Mitsuki decided, turning around with the tray of macarons in his hands. He placed them one by one into the little glass case, arranged by color into a small rainbow. “I’ll just have to do it like my ancestors used to. Take your memories, and leave you on the roadside, dirty, penniless and miles from home.”

Yamato felt a pang of loneliness inside of him at the mere thought. It was getting late in the evening, and soon he would have to go home. He had served his purpose to Mitsuki. He was a quick and willing meal in a world that no longer believed in myths and legends. Soon he’d be back at his apartment, surrounded by takeout boxes and an overworked Roomba, tired and used by the world, with the distinct feeling that something was missing.

“That’s too cruel,” he finally said, unable to think of some clever retort. “Don’t take my memories, at least. I’d feel too empty, without you there to keep things interesting.”

Mitsuki froze once again, wondering what Yamato Nikaido did to him that made him feel so incredibly _human_.

“You’re ridiculous,” he managed to spit out, unable to look Yamato directly in the eyes. It was nice though, Mitsuki decided, to be able to talk like this. To have someone who didn’t see him as a monster. To have someone who valued him, and saw him as something useful. Something that could take away the pain of everyday life.

It just hurt a little when Yamato walked away, when Mitsuki was done being used.

So instead, Mitsuki acted first, grabbing for a fresh pair of rubber gloves and his apron. “I guess I’ll just have to let you go, while I think of a better punishment.”  

“Right, right. Cakes to bake and souls to steal, and all that,” Yamato waved his hand dismissively, trying to hide the vague sting of rejection. He had come into Mitsuki’s workplace, after all. He couldn’t possibly expect to steal his attention entirely, even if Mitsuki had stolen all of his.

“You don’t have to say it like that!” Mitsuki reached over the counter to take a swipe at the man, but Yamato took a step back, chuckling as Mitsuki’s hand missed entirely.

“It can’t be helped, I suppose,” Yamato shrugged. He looked at Mitsuki one last time, his eyes softening with a sigh. “Thanks, as always. For someone who claims to be drinking my life force, you sure do make my life a little less draining.”

Mitsuki laughed, suddenly feeling like maybe his cares and worries were being drained too. “Careful who you say that around, idiot! We’re in public.” He paused, looking around the store. It was getting late, and there weren’t as many customers. Still, they kept their voices hushed. Yamato had found him out, months ago. But if anyone else knew…

“Thank you for the meal,” Mitsuki relented. “Even if you only ever give me the bad stuff.”

“Maybe next time I’ll give you something good,” Yamato replied, wondering if he actually meant it.

“I’ll hold you to it, Old Man.”

Mitsuki smiled, and once again the entire store seemed to twinkle with him, shining a warm fantastical light in Yamato’s cold ordinary world. And as Yamato left the store, he gently touched his lips, wondering what emotions he’d let Mitsuki drink next.  

**Author's Note:**

> Big thank you to my aibous, who gave me the idea for this fic and quite literally held my hand as encouragement. And a big thank you to all of you for reading!~


End file.
